JACKSON, Miss.— Today, Mississippi First released their newest report titled Nothing in the Pipes: Educator Crisis in Mississippi. In recent years, a new problem in a decades-old challenge has emerged: the number of new Mississippi teachers has sharply declined, exacerbating the teacher shortage and threatening the success of public education in Mississippi. This new report…
Read More
The press release was originally published by the Mississippi Charter School Authorizer Board. JACKSON, MS–In 2017, the Mississippi Charter School Authorization Board (MCSAB) was awarded a federal Charter Schools Program grant, which requires the MCSAB to conduct an annual parent survey. For the past two years, MCSAB has contracted with Mississippi First to complete the…
Read More
ANNOUNCEMENT: The Governor has announced how the Governor’s Emergency Education Response (GEER) Fund program will be allocated. The Governor has chosen to divide allocated GEER Funds into two funding categories in order to quickly and efficiently target funds to the state’s most pressing emergency needs. The Governor received $34,662,872. The first category of funds –…
Read More
The Mississippi Department of Education (MDE), in partnership with Mississippi First, has launched a new website for Mississippi teachers to increase teacher access to high-quality instructional materials. The site, Mississippi Instructional Materials Matter, offers a centralized location for Mississippi math and social studies teachers to review high-quality, standards-aligned materials that have been evaluated and adopted…
Read More
School will be different this fall for every Mississippi child. To help districts and parents stay informed, we created a new page on our website. Re-Opening Plan Tracker We have compiled a Google Sheet that provides school plans, social media accounts, and website information for every school district in Mississippi. Know re-opening plans vary widely…
Read More
At Mississippi First, we often get calls or requests from students doing research, interested members of the public, and other advocates seeking to learn more about pre-K-12 public education in Mississippi by interviewing us in person or on the phone about what we do, what we believe, or what we think about an idea the…
Read More
This op-ed originally appeared in the Clarion-Ledger on April 26, 2020. Life never seems to follow a straight line. Six months ago, the Mississippi economy was moving along and all signs pointed to new — read, unallocated — money in the budget for the 2020 legislative session. At last, Mississippi would have money for all…
Read More
